


Crocus

by Caly_X



Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: Gen, Gwent: Saovine Event as canon, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-29
Updated: 2019-11-29
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:00:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,129
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21607945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caly_X/pseuds/Caly_X
Summary: "My turn," Geralt said. "When's a time you had to say, 'It's not what it looks like!'?" He passed the bottle to Regis.Regis took the bottle and swirled its contents slowly as he cast his mind's eye over four centuries' worth of interesting and embarrassing memories. "All right," he finally said, "I've got one."
Comments: 17
Kudos: 56





	Crocus

"The vampire stood in the gloomy room," Regis began in a hushed, faux-dramatic voice. "The maiden draped over his arms was in a dead faint; her head lolled back, leaving her long neck exposed and vulnerable under his slightly open mouth. A coppery stench wafted up from the blood spilled amid shattered glass on the floor. The aura of death permeated the confined space. This was the gruesome sight that greeted the witcher as he opened the door..."

Geralt's eyebrows shot up. "Definitely know what that witcher was thinking," he muttered.

Regis laughed and took a sip of mandrake hooch. "You did challenge me to tell you the story of a moment where I had to explain that things weren't what they seemed, did you not?" he said in his normal voice. He passed the bottle back to Geralt.

"Yeah," Geralt admitted. "So continue."

Regis cleared his throat and put on the corny voice again. "The witcher's name was Vesemir—"

Geralt choked mid-swig. "Vesemir?" he sputtered.

"The witcher's name was Vesemir," Regis repeated with the exact same intonation.

"Vesemir? Of the School of the Wolf?"

"Aye, Vesemir he was; aye, of the School of the Wolf—what, do you mean to say you know him, too?"

"Know him? He is—he was my mentor..."

Regis's face grew serious. "I had no idea."

"...and he was like a father to me," Geralt added. He set the bottle down on the grass between himself and Regis.

"I'm very sorry for your loss," Regis said.

Geralt waved a hand, not meeting Regis's eye. "He died a witcher's death, you know."

Regis nodded. "He was a good witcher."

"That he was."

They observed a moment of silence together.

"You knew him, then," Geralt said. "This was the first time you met?"

Regis grimaced. "Alas, no. Our first meeting happened in rather more unfortunate circumstances. He was the witcher who had led the peasants in thoroughly dismembering me before my first bout of regeneration. No; this is the story of the second time we met."

"Tell it from the beginning," Geralt said.

"From the beginning?" Regis picked up the bottle, took another moderate sip from it, and offered the bottle back to Geralt. "Well, after I had taken a few decades to recover completely from that wild night, I swore I'd never go back to my old ways. I kept company with my friend the Humanist for a while, learning from him a different way of being a vampire, a way that didn't involve abusing the hospitality of our human hosts here in this sphere. Eventually it came time for me to strike out on my own. If you can believe it, there was a time when I didn't know much at all yet; I apprenticed under a barber surgeon in Metinna, then went off to a small town on the Yelena river to start my own shop..."

***

"Rent's due on the first of every month," the landlord said, his eyes focused on something somewhere beyond Regis's head. "In full. If you're late, the amount will be deducted from your deposit, and interest will accrue at a rate of five per cent for each day the rent goes unpaid. You know where to find me... and I know where to find you. Got it?"

Regis nodded.

"All right." The landlord shifted his uninterested stare slightly to the left of Regis's head. "Hope your luck's better than the last barber surgeon we had here in Aep Aevon. Be seeing you." He shuffled out the door without another word, leaving Regis alone in the room.

He shut the door behind the landlord and looked around the room. It was sparsely but sufficiently furnished. There was an unpleasant-looking chair with belts attached, a table next to the chair, and a little bench and cupboard along one wall. That would do for the customers. He peeked in the cupboard: the previous occupant had left some glassware and equipment in it. Having concluded his rapid survey of the very small shop area, he walked through a doorway, ducking under the low lintel, into an even tinier living space. There was a stove, a washbasin, and a straw mattress on the floor. That would do for him.

"Hello, new home," he said quietly, dropping his bag on the mattress. "My name is Emiel Regis. I'm the new barber surgeon in town." He smiled.

\--

"My name is Emiel Regis," Regis shouted over the bustle of the early morning crowd at the market. "I'm the new barber surgeon in town!" He tried to smile carefully, hiding his teeth, but the grocer wasn't looking in his direction.

"Welcome, dearie," she said, bundling up a bunch of turnips by their stalks. "What'll you be having?"

Regis's eyes darted from one pile of colorful vegetables to another. He'd eaten whatever his master had provided in Metinna, and he was just now realizing that he had no idea how humans actually prepared their food. He clutched his string bag to his chest as people pushed past him, unsure of how to proceed. Surely, he thought belatedly, eating human food wasn't really required for assimilating into human society?

The grocer moved on to another customer. Regis became aware of a pair of eyes looking in his direction—perhaps the first pair to really look at him since he'd arrived in Aep Aevon. He turned around.

"I couldn't help overhearing what you said, Mr. Regis," a young woman with brown eyes and a sweet smile said, addressing him very directly. "You're new in town?"

"Yes," Regis said. He added, as an afterthought, "I'm the new barber surgeon." He sidestepped yet another aggressive shopper.

"I overheard that, too," the young woman said, raising her voice slightly to be heard over the increasing buzz of the crowd. "Could I help you with navigating this market? It can be quite overwhelming if it's your first time here. It's always busiest just before dawn. What do you need?"

"Well, I don't really know," Regis admitted reluctantly. "What do you make gruel with? I just need to cook for myself. It's my first time living on my—" He broke off as he nearly got knocked over by a large handbasket passing by at high speed.

The young woman reached a hand out to steady him as he stumbled. "On your own? Well, well, a young man striking out on his own! Wonderful. Forget the gruel. How about we make the rounds of the stalls together? I'll tell you what I'm going to buy, and you can just buy the same things to make a great soup." She began rattling off the names of ingredients at breakneck speed: "Herbs: sage, basil, parsley—" 

"I can't hear you very well over all this noise," Regis said as he started following her around the market. "Why don't you pass me your list?"

"List?"

"The list of ingredients you intend to buy."

The young woman shrugged. "Sir, perhaps _you_ read and write, but not everyone can."

Regis resigned himself to just following her around the market and yelling, "Whatever she's getting!" to each stallholder they visited.

"How do you make this soup?" Regis eventually ventured to ask the young woman.

"First, brown the pork bones in oil," she began, "then add the chopped root vegetables, add water and the bay leaf to cover, bring it all to a boil..."

Pork bones? Regis's nose twitched and itched. He realized with a creeping sense of dread that they were approaching the butcher's stand. The ground around it was wet and reddish. He felt a knot in his stomach. "Excuse me," he said, pushing against the crowd to get away from the smell as quickly as he could.

By the time the young woman turned around to look at him, he had already disappeared.

\--

"Bloody dark in this shop of yours," grumbled the man in the chair.

Regis nodded and carefully scraped the razor up the length of the man's neck. He gave the blade a shake to rid it of accumulated soap and stubble.

"What, don't have money for tallow yet?" the man continued. He was firing off his running commentary on the dismal state of Regis's shop in short bursts strategically placed in the interludes between the strokes of the razor.

Regis nodded again and pointedly put his left hand over the man's mouth to smoothen out his jowl skin for another razor stroke. He didn't lift his hand as he paused to fling more soap and stubble off the blade.

"Mm-mm, mm-mm-mm," mumbled the man indistinctly.

Regis nodded and continued his work in relative peace and quiet.

The shave concluded, Regis toweled off his client's face and handed him a small hand mirror to observe the results. The man rubbed his face and scowled. "Could've nicked me in the dark," he muttered.

Regis nodded. "But I didn't," he pointed out. "I see very well in the dark."

The man grunted, threw a few coins on the table, and left. Regis swept the coins into his pocket without a second glance at the amount. He couldn't afford to be picky about how much he was paid. Just as he was about to head into his little room to check on the progress of his soup, the bell on his shop door tinkled. The young woman from the market entered.

"Hello, Mr. Regis," she said pleasantly.

"Hello, er," Regis said.

"Nettie," she said. "I lost you in the market the other day. I trust you're doing well?"

"Well enough," he said with a weak smile. "Thank you for the help at the market."

"You're very welcome, though it wasn't any trouble at all, I assure you." She looked around the shop. "Dark in here, isn't it?"

Regis pretended not to have heard that last remark. "What brings you to my humble establishment today?" he asked. "I've just had one satisfied customer leave with a clean-shaven face. Perhaps you'd like to schedule an appointment for your husband?"

"I have no husband," Nettie said flatly.

"Oh," Regis said, knitting his brows as he tried to recall what he'd learned and observed of human mating norms. It seemed to him that all the women he met over a certain age were married, at least in Metinna and the surrounding areas. Still, it was foolish to extend this assumption to every single woman. "Perhaps you'd like to schedule an appointment for—" he quickly crossed out "brother" and "father" and "son" and "uncle" in his mind in quick succession—"yourself?" he lamely concluded.

The corners of Nettie's mouth twitched upward. "I have no beard," she said, but this time her voice carried a hint of amusement. "But I do have a purpose in visiting you. You're new here. Perhaps you'd like to come to the upcoming festival with me?"

"What kind of festival is it?" Regis asked, intrigued.

"What kind?" Nettie laughed. "Why, it's only _Belleteyn_!"

Regis turned to glance at his wall calendar, which was hanging right behind his head. The elven part of the calendar showed that the fourth savaed, Birke, was ending, and the fifth, Blathe, was beginning soon. Belleteyn marked the beginning of Blathe. It involved bonfires, Regis recalled, and was celebrated by humans as a fertility festival. He looked at Nettie's expectant face and glanced back at the calendar. The lunar phase part of the calendar showed that Belleteyn coincided with a full moon this year. He had other plans already.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I can't go."

Nettie shrugged. "Pity. I hope you'll change your mind." She looked around the shop again. "You don't have mirrors in your shop?"

"I use hand mirrors," Regis said as he handed her the small mirror, being careful to face it away from himself.

She studied her visage in it. "How time passes," she said very quietly to herself, touching the corners of her eyes. Regis noticed for the first time that she wasn't as young as she had first seemed to him. "It's nice to have a mirror, though, isn't it?" she said aloud in a bright voice. "It's an expensive toy for the likes of us. I should think you like to take a look at yourself from time to time," she said, turning the mirror's reflective side toward Regis's face.

Regis stared at the wall calendar reflected in the mirror. "Not really," he said, snatching the mirror from her hand and swiftly stuffing it away in the cupboard.

Nettie gave him a curious look.

"I have to go check on my soup," Regis said.

"Doesn't smell like soup," Nettie said, sniffing the air.

They went to check on the soup together. Regis groaned.

\--

The night air was cool and damp. Regis squatted on the ground and hovered over his tiny, newly planted herb garden. Nettie had given him cuttings from her garden so as to reduce his herb expenses at the market. He prodded the dark soil and wondered what else would grow in this climate. Despite his lack of practical knowledge in the culinary sphere, Regis was well read on the medicinal uses of herbs and was in fact an adept potion-brewer. He just needed to apply himself to studying culinary recipes as assiduously as he had to studying potion recipes. Unfortunately, the improvisational nature of a lot of Nettie's cooking eluded his grasp.

He made a mental note to go purchase camphor and eucalyptus oil at the herbalist's. It would be a necessary expense.

\--

"Do you really need that up your nose?" the man asked suspiciously.

Regis nodded and finished stuffing the camphor- and eucalyptus oil-soaked gauze up his nostrils. He rolled up his sleeves, secured them in place with his armbands, and extracted a jar from the cupboard.

"Is that really necessary?" the man asked, growing pale as he eyed the contents of the jar.

Regis nodded and pulled a leech out from the jar. It wriggled and writhed between his fingers.

"Is there another way?" the man whispered.

Regis nodded, put the leech back in the jar, and held up a sharp lancing tool and a bloodletting collection jar, breathing in deeply to make sure he couldn't smell anything but the camphor and eucalyptus oil. He couldn't indeed; the medicinal smell in his nose was so strong that the lingering hazy odor of burnt soup couldn't penetrate it, much less the smell of blood.

The man pointed mutely at the leech jar.

\--

Regis drew open the curtains on one side of the shop, stood next to the chair, and looked at the floor. Then he closed the curtains and drew open the curtains on another side of the shop. He went back to his spot next to the chair and looked at the floor again. Still dissatisfied, he closed the curtains and drew open the curtains on the final side of the shop that had curtains. He walked around the shop, looking down at the floor, returned to the curtains, and drew them half-closed. Then he walked around the shop again.

He left the curtains like that; he'd finally found a lighting arrangement that wouldn't draw too much attention to his lack of shadow but which also hopefully wouldn't annoy customers too much for lack of light.

\--

"You're a quiet one, you are," the man in the chair said.

Regis nodded and looked through the assortment of tools that he had laid out on the table.

"You're not from around here?" the man asked.

Regis shook his head and picked up a wicked-looking pair of pliers.

"Where're you from?" the man asked, oblivious to the menacing instrument in Regis's hand.

"Far away," Regis finally replied.

"Can tell by your accent. Don't sound like you're from here," the man said. "Where're you from?" he persisted.

"I trained in Metinna." Regis picked up an even bigger pair of pliers.

"Don't sound like you're from Metinna."

"The last place I was settled in for any length of time was Toussaint."

"Oh, now you're talking," the man said. He added after a pause, "Don't sound like you're from Toussaint."

"My parents were from a faraway land." Regis picked up a chisel in his free hand and slipped it into his apron pocket. The giant pliers followed after it. "You wouldn't know the name."

"Try me," the man said.

Regis shot him a sideways glance and decided that the truth could be spoken without fear of repercussion if it was going to fall on deaf ears anyway. "My people are called Gharasham."

The man pondered for a bit. "Never heard of them," he declared.

"Lean your head back on the chair," Regis instructed as he strapped the man's head down tightly with swift, energetic movements. "And stop talking, or we'll never get that tooth out."

A short, sharp scream rattled the windowpanes of the shop.

\--

Regis sat on the roof and looked at the waxing moon. He felt abandoned.

\--

It was a very quiet day. Not a single customer had darkened Regis's door since the shop had opened in the morning. He sat in the imposing chair and daydreamed. Honestly, except for the lack of income on such days, he preferred it like this.

The shop bell tinkled. Nettie stood at the door. "Quiet day?" she said. Her silhouette was dark against the bright sunlight from the outside.

"It's always quiet," Regis replied, not getting up from the chair.

"Why not take a walk today?" Nettie said.

Regis squinted at her. "It's hot outside."

"It's merely sunny."

"Sunlight... hurts my skin," Regis lied.

Nettie laughed and tossed a tightly furled umbrella at him. He caught it deftly by reflex. "Go on, be like one of the highborn ladies from the capital," she said. "I've noticed you don't like light. They don't, either. They want to keep their skin pale and look down on women like me who work in the sun. But I suppose if your skin really does hurt from the sunlight, you wouldn't despise me for walking about in it, since it doesn't hurt me."

The umbrella unfurled with a loud rustling noise. It was a very large umbrella, and Regis figured that he could keep his entire self shaded under it. He hopped off the chair and followed Nettie out the door, locking the shop behind him.

They made their way past the town square and notice board and down to the riverside, ignoring the horses that shied and the dogs that barked as Regis passed by. Nettie moved with vigorous, long strides, while Regis, attempting to keep himself entirely under shade, shuffled along with quick steps behind her.

"What do you do for a living?" Regis asked.

"I run a small farm to support myself," Nettie replied.

"A young woman striking out on her own—" Regis began. To his surprise, Nettie stopped and turned around with a hurt expression on her face. He promptly shut up.

"It's out of necessity, you understand?" Nettie said softly. "It's not exactly what I chose for myself. It's not the same for young women as it is for young men."

"Why isn't it the same?" Regis asked out of genuine curiosity.

"What world did you grow up in?" Nettie snapped. "Do you really not understand?"

"Not this one," Regis hurried to reply. "I really grew up in quite a different place."

Nettie stared at him for a while before her frown softened. "So the gossip goes about you," she said. "Though nobody can figure out where, exactly."

Regis looked out at the river. Its surface rippled in the gentle wind and reflected the bright sunlight.

"But I don't care," Nettie continued. "That isn't important to me. But before I say anything else, let me tell you frankly: I have no dowry. I am an orphan."

Regis looked at Nettie and allowed some time to pass, in order to give the impression that he had digested this apparently crucial piece of information. "I don't care about that either," he said carefully, though he wondered if he should.

Nettie's face brightened. "Well, then. All right." She coughed. "Belleteyn—it's tomorrow. Will you come with me?"

"I..." Regis looked around, hoping that the right answer would fall out of the sky into his lap. His eyes settled on her hopeful face. "I don't suppose it would hurt."

Nettie was practically skipping for the length of the rest of the walk.

\--

"That girl who keeps coming by here," the man in the chair began.

Regis forcefully stropped the razor on a piece of leather that hung from his belt. The man in the chair nervously watched Regis's strong and fast hands and fell silent.

"So, that girl," the man in the chair resumed after Regis had turned to the table to prepare the lather and towels. "Proposed to her yet? She seems mighty keen on you."

The bar of soap that Regis was using to prepare the lather slipped out of his hands.

\--

Belleteyn meant bonfires; Belleteyn meant bounty; Belleteyn meant beginnings.

Belleteyn meant love. But not for Regis. Belleteyn didn't mean anything to him.

It was the full moon. For him, the full moon meant blood—no; no longer. The full moon meant...

What did it mean to him now?

He spread his wings and noiselessly took off from the tree overlooking the forest clearing where the youth of Aep Aevon were dancing in pairs around a giant bonfire. There was one young woman standing by herself far off to the side.

The wind in his wings made him feel young and wild and free, untethered to the earth, unbound for one night by human rules and expectations. Unbound even by vampiric attachments, which he had left behind of his own will...

The full moon meant loneliness in his utter otherness.

\--

Regis paused in front of the notice board with his string bag of root vegetables hooked over one arm. There was a new notice:

_Witcher Urgently Sought. Large Vampire Bat Spotted Near Forest Clearing. See Council of Elders for Contract._

\--

A knock sounded at the door. Regis looked up from putting away his things. The table was cluttered with the tools of his trade. He left the mess as it was and went to open the door.

In the doorway stood Nettie, her mouth set in a thin, compressed line.

"Five days," she said. "You didn't come that night, and you didn't come to look for me after."

Regis looked down at his shoes. "I'm leaving."

Nettie spat on his shoes. "Coward," she said.

Regis gingerly buffed his soiled shoe on the back of his trousers. "I misunderstood you," he muttered.

"At least apologize," she said, "for making a fool of me." She turned her face aside. "Or for helping me make a fool of myself."

"I apologize," Regis said. He cleared his throat and added in a small voice, "I do protest that I was truly ignorant of your intentions, but I undoubtedly compounded my error with impulsiveness and cowardice."

Her nostrils flared. "You're making fun of me. I don't need to hear the big words you learned from the scribes. They're just as insincere as you are."

"Nettie," Regis implored as he pulled her into the shop and shut the door, "believe me, I truly am sorry."

She shook off his hand and walked over to the cluttered table. "So, you really are leaving," she said coldly, crossing her arms. "Not enough custom? Can't make rent?"

"I could stay," Regis said with an edge to his voice, "but I'm afraid I'm not very welcome here."

Nettie threw up her hands. "You don't go out of your way to make friends, so what did you expect? Gratitude for lancing boils and gifts for shaving beards? You're paid for that. It's your trade."

He sighed.

"Tell me one thing before you go," she said in quite a different voice. "Why did you stand me up? Is it because I'm not young anymore? Because I'm not from a good family?"

Regis hemmed and hawed. "It's not about you," he finally said. "I just don't... Well..."

"Well, well! A confirmed bachelor, then? I'm scraping the bottom of the barrel already, and it turns out there's nothing left!" Nettie covered her mouth with her hand and looked away.

"You'll find someone," Regis said in an attempt to placate her. "Even I, the dregs at the bottom of the barrel, once had someone."

"Leftovers!" Nettie burst into sobs. "I've been going after someone's leftovers!"

"Really, now," said Regis, finally deigning to take offense, "that is not a healthy way of thinking."

"You don't understand," Nettie said through her tears. "You can move wherever you want and ply your trade. You can start over whenever you want. My life is just passing before my eyes and I'm going to be stuck here as an old maid forever." She leaned over the table, her back to Regis. He could see her shoulders trembling as she cried. He reached a hand over to comfort her.

"Don't touch me," she cried out as she turned around sharply. She jostled the things on the table, and tools and jars crashed to the floor, among them some recently filled jars from bloodletting. Regis dived to try to catch them, but they smashed into a million shards before his eyes. Blood spilled everywhere.

"How gruesome," Nettie managed to utter at the sight before she fainted away. Regis barely managed to grab her under her arms before she hit the floor as well.

He looked around for his camphor-soaked cotton, but everything on the table was jumbled together in a big mess. He tried not to breathe through his nose.

At this moment, the door opened. The unfortunately familiar yellow-eyed witcher took in the scene with a glance and swiftly drew his silver sword.

"It's not what it looks like!" Regis yelped. "Hold her for a moment—" he shoved Nettie at Vesemir—"I can explain!"

Vesemir sheathed his sword in a flash and caught Nettie. The witcher checked the girl for wounds while the vampire frantically stuffed cotton up his nose and hurried over with an ampoule of smelling salts. Vesemir shielded Nettie from Regis with his body. "What have you done with the barber surgeon here?" the witcher barked.

" _I_ am the barber surgeon here," huffed Regis. He crushed the ampoule and reached his hand around Vesemir to wave the smelling salts in Nettie's face.

"You'd better have a good explanation," Vesemir said. He sniffed and coughed from the sharp smell.

Nettie revived. She pushed Vesemir away instinctively.

"You've overexerted yourself, Nettie," Regis said nasally but gently. "Go home."

Nettie blinked as the fog of confusion lifted. She ignored Vesemir and stared at Regis. Finally, she summoned all of her strength, slapped Regis so hard that he stumbled back against Vesemir, and made her way out of the shop.

"Funny," Vesemir said dryly, not taking his eyes off Regis as the latter shook his head to clear it and staggered over to the chair. "I could have sworn you looked exactly like a fearsome, bloodthirsty vampire that I met once."

Regis collapsed into the chair and rubbed his stinging cheek. "I regret to inform you that I am indeed that vampire, though I'm no longer bloodthirsty, and apparently no longer very fearsome, either." He raised his eyes to look at Vesemir. "I've sworn off drinking blood altogether. The blood on the floor is from bloodletting, which I practice as part of my trade. The jars broke on the floor and the lady fainted, that's all. As you can see, I can control myself around blood and young maidens now."

"Not doing too well with the latter?" Vesemir said, still making Regis uncomfortable with his unrelenting stare.

"She thinks I slighted her, which I did. I think." Regis shifted uneasily. "Please stop staring at me," he said.

"You're putting on a very interesting act," the witcher said, ignoring Regis's request. "The last time I saw you, you were terrorizing whole villages and sucking them dry. Do you expect me to believe--"

"Vampires can change," Regis pointed out. "I've had a century or so to think about what I've done. It's one of the privileges of being practically immortal. You seem to be long-lived, too; you've hardly aged since I last met you. Surely you've changed in some way yourself? In any case, I belatedly and begrudgingly thank you for convincing me of the error of my ways. It's a lesson I won't soon forget."

Vesemir grunted and shrugged. His demeanor seemed to soften somewhat.

"Anyway," Regis continued, "what's the price on my head this time? It's going to be a terrible inconvenience spending another few decades regenerating from being chopped to bits again, so I hope I'm worth something."

Vesemir scratched his cheek. "To be honest, I saw the notice, but I haven't inquired. I came by here hoping to get a boil lanced first. 'Giant Vampire Bat Spotted Near Forest Clearing' didn't seem particularly urgent. That was you?"

Regis hauled himself up from the chair and searched his instruments for a sharp lancet. "Yes," he said. "I got carried away on the night of the full moon. They were celebrating Belleteyn and I wanted to avoid all that. I also just wanted to stretch my wings a little. I hardly would have if I'd known I'd be spotted, though. Although I don't like it here very much, I'm not particularly eager to leave."

"Hold on," Vesemir said as he noticed Regis holding up an instrument. "Are you intending to lance my boil?"

"Why not? I'm a barber surgeon," Regis said.

"And a vampire," Vesemir said warily. "And I'm a witcher."

"The world's upside down these days, anyway," Regis said nonchalantly. The strangeness of the situation was starting to feel normal. He ducked under the lintel of the little door and stuck the end of the lancet into the fire in the stove to sterilize it. "You have young women wooing unwary barber surgeons, bloodsucking monsters swearing off blood, and now a witcher talking to a vampire a century after their first meeting. Would it really be so odd for me to just lance a boil for you? I'll even do it free of charge. Consider it my final act of voluntary altruism before you chop me up again." He emerged back into the shop area. "Why don't you take a seat?"

Vesemir sighed and complied. Apparently, he, too, was reconciling himself to the absurdity of their circumstances. He undid the top buttons of his gambeson and pulled his collar down a little. "It's on the back of my neck, so I can't lance it myself," he said.

Regis looked closely at the boil. "You know," he said, lancet poised to pierce the boil, "it looks like it'll drain on its own in a couple of days."

"It's annoying," Vesemir said through gritted teeth.

"If you say so," Regis said. "Lean over so I can wash the wound without getting water all over you."

Vesemir leaned over the armrest. Regis lanced the boil, drained it, irrigated the open wound with salted boiled water, and applied a dressing over it. Vesemir felt around his neck cautiously and nodded in approval. He extracted a few coins from his pouch and pressed them into Regis's hand.

"Here," he said. Regis looked at him, surprised. "I'm not going to chop you up, so I think I had better pay you," Vesemir said. Regis unquestioningly slipped the coins into his pocket and laid his instruments aside. "Since I don't have a contract to pursue and have the afternoon to myself now," the witcher continued, leaning back in the chair, "why don't you tell me why you became a barber surgeon? One would think that all the blood and gore would be a temptation to a vampire."

"It was the idea of a friend from whom I learned much and to whom I owe much. He embraced a philosophy of respect toward humans as our hosts here; you know that our kind came here with the Conjunction of the Spheres, and this was an utterly foreign world to our ancestors. For vampires like myself who grew up in crypts among our own kind without mingling with humans, this world remains quite foreign still. We higher vampires don't need to drink blood to survive; it's more of a pleasant and even intoxicating beverage for us to enjoy, like alcohol for humans. Some do partake, as I used to; some do not partake, which is the case with me now. The taste of the smallest drop used to send me into a frenzy and turn into an uncontrolled binge."

Vesemir nodded, clearly recalling the night he'd encountered Regis while the latter had been on a bender to end all benders.

"After my regeneration," Regis continued, "I studiously avoided even the sight of blood and stayed as far away from humans as possible, for fear of falling again into my former addiction. My friend, this humanist, if you will, thought that I should confront my fears head-on instead and not hide away from humans forever. He told me to learn to cope with temptation. He _trusted_ me to learn to cope with temptation." Regis gestured at his nose. "As you can see, I've found some temporary solutions to help me along. Most importantly, however, he told me that I had to learn compassion for humans themselves if I wanted to really rid myself of the temptation to drink. So I took up a profession that involves blood and meeting human needs."

Again, Vesemir nodded sagely. "And do you like it?"

Regis stuck his hands in his apron pockets testily. "I can't say I'm having a terribly good time here in Aep Aevon," he said. "It might just be the people here..."

"It might be your inexperience," Vesemir pointed out. "You said yourself that this is a foreign world to you. It'll remain so as long as you shut yourself up in here and avoid festivals and upset young maidens."

"They'll know I'm a vampire if I go out among them," Regis complained.

"That young woman who has been _wooing_ you, as you put it, has been happily oblivious all this time, apparently. You've somehow even learned enough practical skills to be a barber surgeon, I assume from a human master, for goodness' sake. You're careful enough. You'll survive," Vesemir said.

Regis had to acknowledge that he had indeed been careful, except for his slip-up involving turning into a giant bat on Belleteyn night.

"A couple more pieces of advice, if you'll take them," Vesemir added. "Witchers know that bloodletting's largely useless except for treating an excess of iron in the blood, so you don't need to torture yourself with that cotton up your nose needlessly. Also, take up a hobby that at least gives people an excuse to talk to you about something unrelated to boils and ulcers and rotten teeth."

"What would you suggest?" Regis asked.

"Personally?" Vesemir reached into a pouch and set a little flask of something on the table. "Moonshining."

***

"I'll bet anything that he gave you a flask of White Gull," Geralt muttered with a twinkle in his eye. "We always had it on hand at the dinner table in Kaer Morhen and Ciri once drank it by mistake when she was training with us..." His cheek was resting on his hand and his elbow was resting on his knee. He'd been listening to Regis's story without taking a single sip of the mandrake hooch. It seemed that the time had flown by without them noticing.

"Based on what I've observed of your potions," Regis said, "yes, it was indeed." He got up and stretched. "And that's it. That's my embarrassing story."

"But it wasn't embarrassing at all," Geralt said, "and you've left out the ending. You had a shop in Dillingen by the time I met you. What happened in Aep Aevon?"

Aep Aevon, Regis recalled, had been wiped off the map in some military skirmish years later. His shop and the town itself had been burned down and the fertile alluvial soil by the river salted so that nothing would grow there for a long, long time. But he refused to choose this point of local history as the ending to his story.

"Years later... picture this: a vampire stands in a cosy room in someone's home. He tenderly cradles the infant that he has just delivered. The proud mother opens her arms to receive her child. There's a mess on the floor, of course, but the room is filled with joy and inner light. This is the happy sight that greets the father as he opens the door and says to his wife, 'Nettie, my love...'"


End file.
